


sunrise state of mind

by TRASHCAKE



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: 5k of yearning, A gentle sprinkling of minbin for flavour, Beaches, Crabs as a plot device, Friends to Lovers, I Will Go Down With This Ship, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, M/M, Resolved Romantic Tension, Teeny tiny references to depression, you could call this an australia au if you really wanted to
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-08
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:13:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27454801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TRASHCAKE/pseuds/TRASHCAKE
Summary: Felix is city lights along the horizon, and Chan is desperately trying to reach him.
Relationships: Bang Chan/Lee Felix
Comments: 24
Kudos: 183





	sunrise state of mind

**Author's Note:**

> went on a late-night beach walk, had a fic idea, found out that swarms of soldier crabs aren't a universal beach experience, put it in the fic anyway
> 
> Thanks to Jessie, Jonny and Freddie for somehow being involved in how this all turned out.
> 
> [a crab video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GS2yNVQSb0&ab_channel=Brett%27sDronePhotography0406035455)  
> [the greatest love song ever written (fight me on this)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tVWt2RDsoM&ab_channel=BringMeTheHorizon) (mv tw: blood, zombies, animal death)

Picturesque, Pinterest worthy. Chan’s friends have taken his idea and ran a marathon with it. He’s happy, truly happy, standing on the beach with drying sand between his toes, watching the people he loves turn his offhand comment into a reality.

The tents are set up, Seungmin runs around with Changbin’s lighter, igniting the bamboo torches that surround their beachfront campsite. Jeongin delicately drapes strings of fairy lights through the sand, making sure the connecting solar panel catches the last few rays of the dying sun. 

Hyunjin has taken it upon himself to bring enough citronella candles to protect a group double their size, and Changbin argues with Jisung over the best way to light a fire. Chan chuckles to himself as Changbin pats himself down, trying to locate the lighter that Seungmin has swiped. 

Minho takes the opportunity to swoop in with a lighter of his own, igniting a small flicker of warmth and flame that will soon engulf the wood. Felix offers a round of applause in delight. 

He practically glows, illuminated by the sunset. 

Chan has to look away.

They’ve picked an amazing spot on the beach— Chan’s idea, naturally, met with mild trepidation that’s quickly eased with knowledge and assurance. Yes, they’re camping on the beach, but they’re high enough up that even a king tide won’t touch them. 

Close to the public bathrooms and showers, within walking distance to the closest outlet and communal BBQ. 

It’s the perfect camping spot. 

A little weekend getaway for the eight of them, everyone managing to take a few extra days off to extend their two-day trip to four. It’s Friday afternoon, the arduous drive between their city lives and nine-to-fives all but forgotten as the salt and the sea breeze gets into their system. 

Chan feels energised despite the bone-deep exhaustion that plagues him. His therapist has been bugging him about taking some time to himself, but Chan has never been one for loneliness. He figures this is the next best thing, the Bang Chan Brand of relaxation. 

“Looks good,” Felix says. Chan didn’t notice the company. “Reckon they’ll play nice and let me get a good picture?” 

“Hyunjin’s already spammed Instagram,” Chan replies. He gestures to their friend, already taking aesthetic shots of the lit torches. “And I think there’s more coming.” 

“I meant a group shot— a _nice_ one,” Felix doesn’t have to point out that Jisung is already in a headlock, with Changbin all but wrestling him into the sand. “Someone’s always a fuckhead.” 

“That’s what I love, though,” Chan gazes with fondness over his friends, his chosen family. He sees their individual idiosyncrasies, even as they do something as mundane as setting up a campsite. “They’re our little fuckheads.” 

Felix laughs, pulling out his phone. He’s got alerts set up for the tides, planning ahead so they know the perfect time for a morning surf. From his vantage point, Chan sees that they’re set for an early morning. 

He already knows that Jisung is going to complain when Felix’s chirpy alarm rings out through their tent at four o’clock in the morning. 

He’ll join them, anyway. 

“I think Changbin’s gonna grace us with his presence tomorrow,” Felix informs him. It’s a strange thing to say, considering Changbin’s aversion to water and all things wet. “He mentioned wanting to learn.” 

“Bet you he eats shit.” 

“Bet you he can’t even stand,” Felix offers his hand to shake. The touch lingers. Chan does what he always does and looks away. “But he won’t come in until he’s done it once.” 

“Stubborn,” Chan says, fondly. 

“I think he wants to impress someone,” Felix replies. He narrows his eyes as he glances around the group now gathered around the beginnings of a fire. “I just don’t know who.” 

“Probably you.” 

Felix stumbles a little as Chan elbows him, but he rights himself with ease. Surfer’s instinct. Felix was practically born with a board attached to his feet. 

“Could be,” he says, quietly.

Chan’s stomach drops, but he ignores it. He nudges Felix again. 

“I smell romance.”

A roll of the eyes, Felix taking Chan by the wrist as he drags them both through the sand and closer to the camp. “Nah, that’s just Jisung’s hair burning.” 

He’s right. Jisung has pulled stray strands from his head and dangles them over the fire, laughing to himself as they fizzle and curl in on themselves. Hyunjin watches on in mild concern. 

“Oi, fuckheads!” Felix calls out. His hand slips lower on Chan’s wrist. They’re nearly holding hands. Everyone is looking. “One nice photo before the sun sets!”

He trips over his own feet, weighed down as they drag through the sand. He nearly takes Chan with him— the two stumbling along the beach, fingers almost entwined, their friends barely concealing their amusement. 

Hyunjin ushers them all into the best angle, moving Felix out of Chan’s reach with a small, knowing smile. Even with the length of Hyunjin’s annoyingly long arms, it’s hard to fit everyone into the frame. Changbin gets cut out of two pictures, with only his face visible in the third.

He accuses Hyunjin of having a bias, who argues that he’s just standing in the wrong spot. The nice smiles devolve into chaos as Minho pokes a finger into Seungmin’s side, whose elbow takes a liking to Jeongin’s sternum. 

A blurry picture captures the ruined moment, Hyunjin laughing straight into the camera as he immortalises the rest of the commotion forever.

The only usable photo is one where everyone looks ridiculous, but that’s okay.

That’s just how they are.

And Chan wouldn’t have it any other way.

\------

Chan’s therapist is right. He should be, considering the money Chan pays for his fortnightly visits, but sometimes it's utterly shocking how well this middle aged almost-stranger knows him. 

Chan needs a break. 

He’s had the best Saturday in recent memory— morning in the surf with his best friends, a sore stomach from how much he’s laughed. Hyunjin and Minho find a market during their morning walk, somewhere they’re dragged to for lunch. 

Aloe on the beginnings of sunburns. Barbequed everything for dinner. Meals eaten on the beach with nothing but good company and good tunes blasted from the pair of waterproof speakers Jisung bought especially for the trip. 

The sun sets and Chan is exhausted. Heat, noise, socialisation; sometimes it’s just too much all at once. A sensory overload of sorts. Chan sits quietly and observes the mayhem to the best of his abilities. 

Jisung regales the awed campfire circle with tales from his frequent documentary binges. His most recent obsession being serial killers, and Chan learns some horrific things over a course of half burnt marshmallows. 

“Gross,” Minho wrinkles his nose. “But please, continue.” 

Jisung obliges him, moving on from Gary Ridgway to the biography of Richard Ramirez that he has seemingly memorised.

And that’s where Chan taps out. 

He loves his friends and is always happy to listen. Jisung’s hyperfixations, Hyunjin’s complaints about work. Chan knows more about the industries his friends have found themselves in than he ever thought he’d know, a walking encyclopedia of knowledge via osmosis. 

But he’s organised their trip away for a little downtime, some breathing room. He’ll re-join the conversation later, but for now, he needs to get away. 

“I’m gonna go for a wander,” Chan jerks his thumb down the length of the darkened beach. The only things visible are the lights of the town they’re a twenty minute drive from, small dotted orbs down the coast. “I won’t be too long.” 

“Yes you will,” Miho pipes up. He fixes a marshmallow to the end of a chopstick, thrusting the entire thing into the fire. The treat, as well as the stick that holds it, quickly erupts into flames. “Take a torch or something.” 

“Got my phone,” Chan pulls the device from his pocket, showing it off as proof. He checks his battery, making sure he’s got enough to last him through the walk. “I’m on sixty percent, I’ll head back when it reaches forty.” 

“I’ll save Dahmer for when you get back,” Jisung says. Chan’s not entirely sure if he should be thankful or not. 

“Want some company?” 

Chan has to pause before he answers, because it’s Felix who offers. Anyone else and he would have declined, but Felix is Felix. He’s _different_. Time spent with Felix both stretches on through eternity, yet also passes in the blink of an eye. 

“If you want,” Chan finally replies, shrugging as nonchalantly as he can manage. “I’m just walking, though.” 

“Yeah, nah, don’t swim at night,” Jeongin pipes up. He steals Minho’s thoroughly charred marshmallow. “Too many sharks.” 

“There are no sharks here,” Seungmin argues. 

Jisung stares off into the dark water, a faraway look on his face. “There are _always_ sharks.” he says. 

Chan takes it as his cue to leave. 

Felix stands, brushing the sand from the seat of his pants. “Shall we?” he asks. 

Chan resists the temptation to take his hand and run.

\------

Felix and Chan. Chan and Felix. 

They’re _complicated_. 

And everyone knows it. 

Chan, especially, understands that there’s something there, a thread pulled taut between them. Something frayed and worn, one moment away from snapping. Chan knows this, but it’s what happens after the break that concerns him. 

Felix runs a finger up the bare skin of Chan’s back, a motion for his wetsuit zipper to chase. He clings to Chan in the surf, lips brushing against his neck as Felix giggles. Sometimes Chan watches him lick the salt from his lips as an afterthought. 

It drives him insane. 

And now they’re alone on the beach, listening to the sound of the waves and their stumbling footsteps illuminated by the light of the stars and the torches on their phones. The thread is wearing thin. 

This is where it snaps. 

Now, Felix is touchy. He likes contact, he drapes himself across all of their friends, practically purring as stray hands find their way into his hair. Chan acts like he’s indifferent, that he’d do the same if any of his friends sat in his lap.

But he can’t, because it’s Felix, and Felix is different. 

What lies between them is lingering touches, secret moments and barely concealed intention. They flirt, and for Chan, it extends past attraction, out into the unknown and terrifying realm of real feelings and emotions. 

He doesn’t know if Felix is the same, if their stolen glances and almost moments mean as much to him as they do to Chan. 

There’s only one way to find out, but it’s a scary step that Chan can’t take, not yet. So when Felix threads their fingers together, swinging their joined hands between them as they walk, Chan does nothing but hold on for the ride. 

“I hope we see some crabs tonight, hey,” Felix breaks the silence that hangs between them, his thumb draws a line down Chan’s finger. “They’re pretty cute.” 

“Is that the only reason you came with me?” Chan gasps in mock offence. “You didn’t want my company, you just wanted to see some crabs.” 

“All the commotion by the camp has scared them away.” 

Felix slows to a stop, and since they’re holding hands, Chan does so too. His options are to let go and continue moving, or keep the treasured contact between them and stop. So he pauses, shining his torchlight onto Felix’s extended foot as it pokes around in the sand. 

“These are little crab houses, you know?” He traces an arc around a hole in the sand. “I reckon we’ll see more of them a little further up.” 

“You _are_ only here for the crabs,” Chan jokes. He knows he’s wrong, he just doesn’t feel the need to break their thread prematurely. It will happen, naturally and with time. “I thought we were friends.” 

“You’re pretty great,” Felix gives an exaggerated sigh. “But you’re no crustacean.” 

“I could be, you just don’t know it.” 

“I would let that slide if you were a Cancer, but you’re not,” he sticks his tongue out at Chan, who resists the temptation to follow its movement as it darts back into his mouth. “So, what I said stands: pretty great, but not a crab.”

“Right back at you,” Chan squeezes Felix’s hand. He receives one in response. “About being great and also not a crab.” 

“I’d like you more if you had pincers, I won’t lie.” 

Chan sputters out a noise of shock, and Felix detangles their hands to make twin clamping movements with his fingers. “It’s cute, don’t ya think?” 

“I think…” Chan trails off. His hand feels empty. “I think crabs are cute, but you’re heaps cuter.” 

The thread pulls tight, another segment frays. Chan holds his ground. 

“Oh,” Felix says simply. “Thank you?” 

“C’mon, let’s keep going.” 

Chan feels bold in the dark, takes Felix’s hand again, unprompted. He doesn’t resist, and Chan knew he wouldn’t. 

But it’s still a sign. 

And a really, really good one at that.

\------

Felix’s claims of more crabs come to fruition. The sand under their feet goes from flat, waterlogged, to textured. Small balls rolled away from underground homes, they squash under their weight as they continue along the beach. 

The lights in the distance stay where they are, each bend of the shoreline somehow keeping them in their place. They’ve been walking for a while, the light of their campfire only a speck in the distance, the noise of their friends long having been drowned out by the waves. 

Chan can see so far behind him, yet the invitation of the lights ahead stays so far out of reach. It’s like the city moves two places backwards for every footstep taken in its direction. 

Ironic that Chan shares such a moment with Felix. Constant progression yet stagnant feelings. A brightness drawing Chan onwards without promise of it ever being reached. He feels like he could walk for days and still never meet the shimmers of the horizon. 

“Wanna sit?” 

Felix doesn’t wait for a response, not really. He drags Chan by the hand, up and away from the waves lapping at their feet. The water sticks to fresh, dry sand as they make their way up onto the dunes, a particularly high peak being chosen as their resting spot for the evening. 

“I can’t really see the others anymore,” Felix comments. He lets go of Chan’s hand as he settles into the sand, but curls into Chan’s side immediately as he does the same. “Wonder if they’re still up?” 

“They won’t be by the time we get back, I don’t think,” he turns his flashlight off, an effort to conserve battery and cultivate the mood. “Everyone was pretty dead.” 

“I’m pretty dead,” Felix replies. He shuffles his position, resting his head on Chan’s shoulder. “But this is nice. I’m glad you let me come along.” 

“You’re always welcome, you know that.”

The _because it’s you_ remains unsaid. The <>I always want you around feels like too much. And the _please tell me you feel the same_ remains, as always, gasping a dying breath on the tip of Chan’s tongue. 

“Do you know any constellations?” Felix asks, changing the subject. He’s not stupid, he feels it, too. The moment—there but not quite right. “Follow up question, should we put on some music?” 

“No and yes, in that order,” Chan brushes the sand from his phone, but it’s useless. His hands are covered with the stuff, scratching along the screen under Chan’s fingers. “My playlist okay?” 

_for him._

It’s Chan’s collection of songs that remind him of Felix, expertly curated in the depths of sleepless nights, based on memories and moments and times that weren’t quite right. He’s not embarrassed as Felix looks over his shoulder. He knows about the playlist, follows it on Spotify and everything. 

Sometimes Chan catches him listening to it. 

He wonders if he’s figured it out, yet, seen how the number of songs grows with every moment they spend together. It’s Chan’s heart, laid bare to love songs sung about people he’ll never meet.

“I don’t know any constellations, either,” Felix says. He talks over the first chorus of Follow You by Bring Me The Horizon. “But this song totally fits with that group of stars.” 

Felix points to a random cluster off to their right, and Chan draws courage from the greatest love song ever written. He traces gentle fingertips along Felix’s forearm, shifting ever closer. Chan watches the hair raise in the wake of his touch, hears Felix’s shaky exhale, feels the tremble of his fingers as he wraps his hand around Felix’s own. 

“Those stars right there?” 

“Yeah,” Felix breathes. Chan feels the movement of Felix’s lips on his jaw. “They look like a pair of hands.” 

“I think they’re pretty.” 

Chan doesn’t see it, but he turns Felix’s hand over and slides their palms together. Looking up into the sky, he tries to find a similarity between the glittering dots and the magic he sees in front of him. 

“Is this the part where you call _me_ pretty?” Felix’s lips push a little harder against Chan’s skin. 

“If you want me to, then yes.” 

“Do you compare my freckles to the stars or some shit?” Felix laughs, breathless. He lets go of Chan’s hand, but immediately brings it to his chest. His touch burns through Chan’s shirt, a fiery trail from sternum to shoulder. 

He pauses. “Is that what you want to hear?” Chan finally asks. He’s never thought to make that sort of connection, but now that it’s been brought up, it’s a thought that will never leave his mind. 

Felix’s nose bumps against Chan’s cheek, lips pressed to skin in the barest hint of a kiss. Chan could turn his head, connect their mouths together, push Felix into the sand. It’s a moment, another frayed edge, but nothing snaps.

“I came here for crabs,” Felix says, breaking the moment as he blows a stream of air into Chan’s ear. He scrambles to his feet, looking breathtaking and devious in the moonlight.

“Not for the good company and love songs?” 

“Those are a bonus,” Felix laughs. 

Chan reaches for his hand once more, but it’s waved off. Felix loops an arm around Chan’s middle, a half hug that takes more effort and coordination with their unstable footing in the sand. But it’s perfect, comfortable. 

The Chan of days past would have killed to hold Felix in his arms. 

The Chan of the present simply basks in the moment.

\------ 

Felix is right about the habits of crabs. Chan has never had any reason to doubt him, and he won’t be starting any time soon. The further they walk from people-heavy areas, the more crabs they begin to see. It starts off small, one or two here and there, each one a proclaimed friend of a very excited Felix. 

They come in all different sizes, some discernable from the bubbling of seafoam and big enough that their eye stalks peek out from the shallows in which they hide. Each one of them white, almost clear, blending in with the waves as the presence of humans disturbs them. 

“God, they’re so fucking cute,” Felix coos. 

Chan nearly trips over a collection of them, hastily righting his footing so nothing is crushed beneath his footsteps. He can tell Felix appreciates it, even when Chan’s fumbling sends him knee first into wet sand. 

“C’mon, let’s walk up a bit,” Chan hauls Felix to his feet, palms resting on his shoulders as he steers Felix up onto the drier sand. The crabs prefer the damp sections of the shore, so while the sand sticks uncomfortably to their wet feet, it’s safer. “Less chance of accidental crab crushing up here, and we can still see them run.”

“They’re off to do important crab things,” Felix agrees, “it wouldn’t be right to disturb them too much.” 

Each step brings more crabs, swarms of pale critters sent scurrying into the waves. Thousands of them, so many it would be impossible to count, all resting along the water’s edge. They resemble seafoam in a way, clustered together like the lapping of waves on the shore. 

Even when they scatter they follow a similar pattern, their movements tracing the same ebb and flow of the ocean. 

Felix is transfixed by them. Chan is transfixed by Felix. The crabs watch them wearily, and a circle of attention is formed, broken only when Chan is too distracted to watch his feet, yelping as one lone crab hurries out of harm's way. 

“Watch where you’re going,” Felix scolds, teasingly. 

“Sorry, I got distracted.” 

Felix slows to a stop, it starts a new domino of movement of crabs into water. 

“You wanna talk about it?” he asks. 

The therapist was his idea. 

Sometimes things are too much, intrusive thoughts in the back of his mind. It’s not something he really wants to offload onto his friends, so he offloads it on a stranger instead. The whole thing earns him a dent in his paycheck and a prescription for pills he can’t pronounce. 

Chan gives the incriminating slip of paper to Seungmin, whose day job is that of a pharmacist. In return, he’s handed a paper bag the next time they all meet up. It’s not a secret. It shouldn’t be one, either. 

It’s just so hard to talk about. 

“For once it’s not my head,” Chan says, finally. He digs at the sand with his toes. “Well it is, but it’s not.” 

Felix looks at him for a moment, and Chan has never felt so bare, so transparent. Felix can see right through him, knows Chan better than anyone else. 

“We should sit,” he says, simply. There is nothing more to say, no words when actions can so readily take their place. Chan obeys, because it’s Felix, and he can’t really bring himself to do anything but.

Felix looks down at him, the moonlight hitting half his face and casting the other into shadow. He’s beautiful. Chan tells him as such. He watches as Felix closes his eyes, a steadying breath of an inhale that catches in his chest, before stuttering on the exhale. 

He seems to be bracing himself, working up the courage to do something, anything, finally. Chan sits still and silent, afraid that words and movement may spook him, just like the crabs they’ve come to watch. He looks as pale as them, too— almost glowing. A celestial, otherworldly. 

He’s everything, and he’s looking straight at Chan.

Slowly, he sits himself right on Chan’s lap, gently positioning his legs around Chan’s hips.   
He moves cautiously, like his fears are mirrored, that they’re crossing boundaries they can’t return from or halfheartedly write off. Cautiously, his arms come to rest on Chan’s shoulders, the tension in his own giving him away.

Chan is almost certain that he stops breathing for a moment, blacking out into a dream state. His head swims as he comes to, his body, somewhat on autopilot, bringing his hands to rest on the small of Felix’s back. 

Too much, yet not enough. Everything else can be weakly passed off in the name of friendship, but this is intimate. Felix rakes sandy fingertips through the back of Chan’s hair, a silent gesture of comfort that does nothing of the sort. 

“Is this helping?” he asks. It’s likely that he thinks his actions are calming, and that Chan’s blood pressure hasn’t spiked. It’s sweet, it’s cute, it’s infuriating— Felix should know by now, he should be acutely aware of the things that just a look can do to Chan’s fragile emotions. 

“Not in the slightest,” he sounds as choked up as he feels, making sure to pull Felix closer so that he doesn’t misinterpret anything and move away. “But I don’t want you to stop.” 

“No stopping,” Felix says, quietly. “I got you.” 

Blunt nails drag down the back of Chan’s neck. He gasps, throwing his head back. Felix tilts his own to the side, following the movement with parted lips. 

“Hey Chan?” he whispers, small and soft and unsure. “Is this…” he swallows, and Chan’s hands move to grip desperately at Felix’s shoulder blades. “Is this where we keep going, or?” 

“Depends on what you mean by that.” 

Chan is emboldened, placing a cautious, open mouthed kiss on Felix’s collarbone— the barest touch of his tongue against skin, the slow drag of his lips. Felix gasps, his hands returning to Chan’s hair in a desperate scramble, tugging at the strands. 

“It means that you do that again,” he says. Chan can feel his rapid breathing where their chests press together, relishes in the tightening of Felix’s legs around his hips. “It means that you don’t stop, either.” 

With every kiss to Felix’s salty, sandy skin, Chan takes the thread between them and tugs. Every brush of lips and flash of teeth, he frays what’s left between them. His path leads from Felix’s collarbones and up his neck, punctuated by breathy sighs barely heard over the sounds of the waves. The thread unravels, strand by strand, until there’s barely anything left. 

Chan is beyond desperate, mouthing hungrily at what skin he can find. He’s spurred on by hands in his hair, pushing and pulling depending on where his mouth is, what part of Felix’s skin it covers. 

He’s pulled away, and Chan hears Felix curse as he licks the salt and sand from his lips. The moment is palpable, past the point of no return. He looks up at Felix’s parted lips and glossy eyes, takes the thread and unravels the final piece.

Chan kisses Felix, and it feels like coming home.

\------

The walk back to the camp takes twice as long as the walk there, purely because neither of them can keep their hands to themselves. Chan finds himself pushed into the sand on more than one occasion, Felix’s hands and mouth wandering, discovering places that were once only seen in stolen glances. 

Chan, too, has his own fun— flipping Felix onto his back and pinning his hands above his head, watching as those eyes darken in unspoken promises of _next time_. 

Kissing Felix becomes everything, a habit formed mere minutes after their first kiss, one that Chan doesn’t see himself breaking anytime soon. 

“So,” Felix pulls back, just slightly. Chan chases his lips, catches them, cuts Felix off mid sentence. “This, us,” he gestures to the space between them and the lack thereof. “Wanna tell me what’s going on in that head of yours?” 

“Kiss Felix,” Chan says. And so he does. Again and again, smiling into each one like it’s the first time all over again. “That’s what my brain has been like for a while.” 

He decides to answer truthfully, bare his soul just that fraction further. If Felix is going to let him down, now is the time. He just has to hope that any and all rejections come gently— Chan is emotionally hardy, but never when it comes to Felix.

“Are we gonna dance around this again?” Felix laughs. “We're just gonna make out for a few years until one of us decides we’re dating?” 

“If that’s what you want,” Chan replies. He’s being completely serious. He’ll take whatever Felix has to offer him, while secretly, greedily wishing for more. “But if you want to save us the hassle, we could just do it now?” 

“What, say we’re dating?” Felix mouths at Chan’s jawline with a lazy grin. “You want me to call you my boyfriend, Chan?” 

“More than you’d ever know,” Chan stutters out his reply, distracted by Felix’s mouth and its downward path. “Unless you—” 

“—I want that,” Felix cuts Chan off before he can say anything further. “So can I?” 

“Yeah,” Chan replies. 

For the umpteenth time of the night, he finds himself with his back in the sand, with a lapful of Felix. 

“Boyfriend,” he whispers, before their mouths meet once more. 

It sounds good.

Chan doesn’t think he’ll ever get sick of it.

\------ 

“What the fuck,” Hyunjin groans. He’s awake, coming back from what Chan assumes to be the direction of the bathroom. “First the others, now you two,” he gestures vaguely to the tent behind him, the one he was supposed to be sharing with Felix, Minho and Changbin. “What’s in the water, here?” 

“I’m gonna call it _Finally Juice_ ,” Felix beams. He’s dishevelled, marked up, holding hands with a Chan in an equal state. 

The first hint of a sunrise peeks over the horizon. 

The dawn of a new day.

“And I’ll agree when I’m more awake,” he stumbles towards the tent on uneven feet, groaning loudly as he opens the zip and peeks inside. “They’re cuddling, it’s disgusting.” He informs them.

Offering a brief wave in farewell, Hyunjin and his bedhead disappear behind the tent’s fastenings as they’re closed. Felix stifles a giggle with the back of his hand, it turns into a yawn halfway through.

Chan’s tired, too. Less exhausted than he was when he set out on his walk, but still tired. He doesn’t want to leave Felix, though, not for a moment, and not while the knowledge that he can just reach out and _touch_ is fresh and new.

“Wanna stay out here and watch the sunrise?” Chan asks him, finally. Felix might want to sleep, in which case he’ll just have to squeeze yet another extra body into a tent made for three. “Maybe hang around for a bit and go for a surf when it’s more light out?”

Felix was ethereal in the moonlight, but the steady creep of day has him appear more real. Solid. _Chan’s_. Felix smiles at him, small but sure, and Chan finds himself dragged down to the ocean once more, feet gaining a brand new layer of sandy coating, one washed away by the beginnings of the waves.

“With you?” Felix says finally, squeezing lightly at their joined hands. “There’s nothing else I’d rather do.”

The sun rises behind them, shining warmth and blessings on the new day and the new, budding relationship that comes with it. 

The sun, the beach, his friends, his _boyfriend_. This trip is everything Chan could ever need, right in one place. 

There’s nowhere else he’d rather be.

**Author's Note:**

> Talk to me about crabs, chanlix and bmth on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/texaschansaws)!


End file.
